<p>Under Bill it was a party but a lot of #@1&^% went down that we paid for later.</p>
<p>Voted for him twice. Still like him.</p>
<p>But no, don’t really want to go back to Bill’s way.</p>
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<p>It would be absolutely fine with me. </p>
<p>If you want to give, give. You don’t need a deduction to be generous.</p>
<p>No more non profit status…for anyone or anything.</p>
<p>How about getting rid of all of them?</p>
<p>Tax forms could fit on a post card. (Well on a single page, since nobody uses post cards)</p>
<p>How much did you earn, from any source? Send us 10% (or whatever %. Could be a higher percentage for higher earners.)</p>
<p>Think of all the tax preparers and lawyers and IRS personnel who would be unemployed.</p>
<p>Close tax loopholes. For example, in 2010, General Electric paid 0 in taxes on $14 billion in profits. Close offshore accounts and restrict companies from leaving profits in foreign accounts. End charitable deductions. End possibly the biggest corporate tax haven in none other than…Delaware!!! There are more companies there incorporated than citizens and is ridiculous that companies can lower their taxes in another state. Restrict income shifting.</p>
<p>Lets not forget about changing the way “carried interest” is taxed at a lower rate than “regular income”. That has to go first.
Second is eliminating tax loopholes for industries that dont need an incentive to survive- such as Big Oil.
And I agree with the elimination of “non-profit” statuses. The term “Non Profit” is a non sequitur, if not an outright lie, in way too many cases.</p>
<p>Eliminate tax exemptions for churches (broadly defined).</p>
<p>Eliminating tax exemption would close down my congregations and lead to two blighted buildings, as no one could afford to purchase them.</p>
<p>Two large (sanctuary seats 550), landlocked buildings with no resale value except for church use. Property taxes would be enormous and our received donations are less than 25K/year. But we serve the community in many ways, providing meeting space for non-profits with NO income, food for unemployed neighbors, meals at the homeless shelter.</p>
<p>dietz199–why eliminated non-profit standing? That classification saves me a LOT of money in my health insurance costs every year. I think you are confusing non-profit with “tax exempt”. They are not the same. Yes, non-profits can make money, and many of them make millions, however, there are regulations as to what they have to do with their profits.</p>
<p>Personally, for individual income taxes I would like to see every deduction done away with and go to a flat rate tax, simple, easy but it would put 1000’s out of work so probably will never happen.</p>
<p>Business taxes are a different story though.</p>
<p>^^As for the non profits…one glaring example.</p>
<p>In conversation with our health insurance broker I was informed that Blue Cross is non-profit, but Blue Shield is for profit. The CEO of BC received approximately 3X the annual compensation of the BS CEO AND the rate increases for BC were greater than those for BS. Non-profits are not what they seem. Why only get rid of personal deductions and not business deductions? BTW…getting rid of business deduction would be far more detrimental to my family that the personal deductions …but we are just waxing philosophical here…right?</p>
<p>short answer ALL of them, credits too (including those for higher ed). Start phasing them out over time, say 10 years. </p>
<p>But of course, that is naive dreaming since any future Congress could stop the phase out.</p>
<p>The reason for business deductions is that they are a cost to make a profit. If you have revenue of $100 and it costs you $50 in materials or labor, then your profit before taxes is $50. You want profit to equal revenue? That would wipe out most businesses.</p>
<p>On higher-ed credits - we could get rid of those but we’d need something to replace them. I wouldn’t necessarily be against that idea - do it with something other than the tax system.</p>
<p>How about one at a time? And focus on big ones like mortgage deduction. I agree with getting rid of non-profit. It is not what it looks like. It has gotten too big. All charitable family trusts will go.</p>
<p>A lot of the non-profit stuff does seem funny. We have wealthy education establishments paying huge salaries and hoarding cash and real estate and timber while the cities that they reside in have revenue problems.</p>
<p>I think that you’d have to phase these things out as many wouldn’t survive (non-profits and individuals with mortgages) without a transition period. You don’t just pull the rug out from people with no notice.</p>
<p>FYI </p>
<p>[The</a> Case for Making Harvard Pay Taxes](<a href=“The Rich University: The Mother of all Tax Breaks | The Fiscal Times”>The Rich University: The Mother of all Tax Breaks | The Fiscal Times)
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<p>Harvard’s endowment is over 30 billion bucks.</p>
<p>dietz199–again-so what. Non-profit doesn’t mean what you think it means. I think you are confusing it with tax-exempt–not the same thing. In our state all health insurance companies have to be not-for-profit, by law. That doesn’t mean they don’t make money and pay taxes because they do. It also means they have to turn 95% of their profits back to policy holders, most commonly done by a reduction in overall premiums…what is wrong with that?</p>
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<p>Perhaps we could reset the income tax back to what it was like after the 1986 simplification, with the following changes:
- Adjust all brackets for inflation or for the intended level of revenue.
- Eliminate special capital gains treatment, except that the basis can be indexed for inflation.
- Appropriate handling of longer term things to smooth the transition.</p>
<p>Indexing capital gains for inflation is a huge tax cut. The truth is the wealthy did really well with the latest tax changes.
I don’t think the wealthy want the 1986 tax rates. I think that is one reason the 1986 tax structure did not hold.</p>
<p>I liked the 1986 tax structure although there was that bubble that screwed the upper middle class.</p>
<p>Tax brackets are adjusted for inflation.</p>
<p>Why would you index capital gains for inflation? Presumably, your gains would be bigger due to inflation. Same thing with dividends. Indexing is for amounts, not rates.</p>
<p>Instead of Congress trying to figure out which deductions to eliminate I would rather see them focusing on which ones to keep. I say we get rid of all but 5 (or some magical number) for individuals and businesses. </p>
<p>Some have suggested going back to the Clinton tax era. Would that include going back to the Clinton spending levels? (this is a fiscal question, not a political one)</p>
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<p>I don’t think we want to punish success. Let’s just do a flat tax and make it even across the board.</p>
<p>From my vantage point, I see religious organizations doing a great deal to help out those less fortunate (at home and in third world countries). Would the government step in to fill these shoes with the tax savings? One might hope so…</p>
<p>In my area the restaurant business is suffering as a result of the recent tax hike. H and I find ourselves going out to eat less often and are not even discussing travel. My point is that I can see the direct hit to our neighborhood of less money in our paychecks.</p>
<p>This morning on the radio, I heard that the Florida Governor is taking about some program that will add another million people in his state to Medicare. I didn’t catch the details, but that isn’t going to be cheap.</p>